February 6, 2012

The Trib Takes On Forecast The Facts

The anti-science Braintrust attempts to defend anti-science meteorologists today. Unfortunately (for them) they stumble into their own contradiction. But we'll get to that in a sec.

First they play the Soros card:

An effort backed by extreme-left billionaire George Soros to restore the deservedly dwindling credibility of "science" distorted to serve anti-growth politics is targeting TV meteorologists who don't buy the global-warming orthodoxy.

The deceptively named Forecast the Facts campaign's website says it's "led by 350.org, the League of Conservation Voters and the Citizen Engagement Lab ... ." But it doesn't say that Mr. Soros' Open Society Foundations gave Citizen Engagement Lab a two-year, $300,000 grant in 2010.

Curious how a coterie that routinely bypasses any mention of how their own billionaire boss routinely funds some of the biggest climate science deniers (Heritage Foundation - $23 million+ of Scaife money) seems to be offended when someone else's billionaire boss grants money to science defenders. How surprising is that?But before we move onto the braintrust's contradiction, let me counter their dishonest use of the term "dwindling". They're looking to get you to believe that there's less credible science out there on climate change.

When in fact there's more. From NASA (remember them? They put some guys on the moon a few decades ago):

A new NASA study underscores the fact that greenhouse gases generated by human activity -- not changes in solar activity -- are the primary force driving global warming.

The study offers an updated calculation of the Earth's energy imbalance, the difference between the amount of solar energy absorbed by Earth's surface and the amount returned to space as heat. The researchers' calculations show that, despite unusually low solar activity between 2005 and 2010, the planet continued to absorb more energy than it returned to space.

Not that it'll matter to those who are paid to write anti-science editorials.

They've just admitted that "TV meteorologists" are not climate scientists. But when, for example, David Paul (Paul is one of those mentioned on the Forecast The Facts website. He's a meteorologist but not climate scientist) of KLFY says that the IPCC report has "failed" he's plying his expertise in weather forecasting into expertise in climate science. Paul is one of those mentioned on the Forecast The Facts website.

And he gets it wrong. And that's precisely Forecast The Facts point.

By the way, Mr Paul touts his AMS Seal of Approval on his bio page. The AMS, incidentally, agrees with the science:

[T]here is adequate evidence from observations and interpretations of climate simulations to conclude that the atmosphere, ocean, and land surface are warming; that humans have significantly contributed to this change; and that further climate change will continue to have important impacts on human societies, on economies, on ecosystems, and on wildlife through the 21st century and beyond.

And I am not sure whether the braintrust sees their own selves in their anti-science mirror:

No TV viewer should put any stock in what's clearly propaganda pimping pseudoscience.

I have to ask, if the National Academy of Science (of the US and many other countries), the Association for the Advancement of Science, the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the various University departments full of climate scientists are all pedaling "propaganda pimping pseudoscience", then who should we believe? James Inhofe?

Is Senator Inhofe also going to evaluate my health? Can he design new cars to help the US use its energy more wisely? Will he design the next generation of space vehicle, to help build President Newt's moon base?

We already know that Republicans are demanding (christian fundamentalist) religious associations be given jurisdiction over biological history, vis a vis how species change over time (the "e" word I dare not say).